- Female lobsters attract a mate by releasing a pheromone-laden urine from openings just beneath their eyes. They then waft it towards the male of their choosing.
- Cows have strong social bonds and even have best friends within their herds. If they are separated from their friends, they can experience significant stress.
- The queen bee is the mother of all bees in the hive. Worker bees are her daughters, and drones are her sons. However, only the queen bee and the drones have a father – worker bees are the product of unfertilized eggs.
- Chickens have complex social structures known as a “pecking order.” Every chicken knows its place on the social ladder and bullies those below them.
- Some fish, such as the stickleback, exhibit “parental care,” with the male guarding the eggs after the female lays them.
- Puffin pairs often reunite at the same burrow site each year. Both parents take turns incubating the egg and feeding the chick.
- Not only do bald eagles mate for life, but the pair also works together to build and maintain a nest, which they will often return to year after year.
- Foxes are quite family-oriented. Both parents care for the young, and sometimes older siblings from previous litters will stick around to help raise their younger siblings.
- Geese families have many names. A male goose is called a gander, a female is a goose, and a group on the ground is a gaggle. In flight, they’re known as a team, skein, or wedge, and when flying closely together, they form a plump.
- In the enchanting realm of C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia, a convocation of owls is intriguingly termed a ‘parliament’. This whimsical nomenclature has since taken flight and nestled itself into our everyday language, giving us a unique way to refer to a gathering of these wise creatures.
Navigating Natty Wines
Christine Burns Rudalevige
